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Students St. Joseph’s Catholic Secondary School were treated to some music and an inspirational speech by Juno Award-winning singer/songwriter Peter Katz on Wednesday afternoon.

Katz’s speech in front of the student body was part of the Youth Symposium being organized by the Cornwall Community Police Service. The symposium began on Monday with a professionals’ day, while Tuesday and Wednesday were dedicated to school visits with an inspirational speaker.

The Toronto-based musician said he was approached about being that speaker by a friend who had been the speaker at a previous symposium.

“He recommended me for it because he couldn’t do it this year. So I met with the staff sergeant and here I am,” said Katz.

The globetrotting singer went on stage inside a packed auditorium in front of several hundred people to tell them that there was a point where the mere thought of doing exactly that would have terrified him to his core. Katz shared the story of how he had overcome the crippling vulnerability he had felt in front of crowds and how it led him into a successful career as a musician.

He said the point he wanted students to take away from his speech is that feelings of trepidation are natural— but if they decide to work through them, they can find out what those emotions have been holding them back from.

“The main thing is to see vulnerability and discomfort as a good thing and to get curious about what is on the other side of those feeling,” he said.

During his speech, Katz described how he had decided to get over his fears by trying to perform at open-mic nights in Toronto, and although it was very hard at first, the discomfort dropped every time he tried.

Eventually, he was comfortable enough to join a production of the play The Laramie Project, which is a play written based on interviews with townspeople after a young gay man, Matthew Shepherd, was murdered after being beaten and left tied to a fence outside of his hometown of Laramie, Wyo., in 1998.

The production’s director heard Katz had been singing at open mic nights and asked him to write a song for the conclusion of the play. After two weeks of effort, he produced a song called “Fence,” which he performed for the St. Joe’s students. He was told by the director thathe should be a professional singer/songwriter but said at that point he wasn’t ready to hear that.

“I tucked those words away in my brain for safekeeping,” he told the students.

It wasn’t until he saw the Oscar-winning Irish musician, Glen Hansard, perform at a concert in Toronto that he knew he wanted to be a musician. Kats told the students he started off small, playing gigs in Toronto and eventually going to more and more cities over time. Even then, most of his concerts were very poorly-attended.

He recorded some albums, and when Hansard returned to Toronto, he stood in line to meet his idol and give him a copy of his album. Hansard politely took the CD and left.

When the Irish singer returned again, Katz once again went to the concert, and Hansard spotted him in the crowd and called out to him from the stage to come up and sing one of the songs from his album. Katz got on stage to sing, and Hansard joined in; he knew the words.

Katz had a video of this moment shot on a cellphone and showed it to the students and also played the whole song himself for them. Hansard later agreed to sing on Katz’s next album.

He told the students none of that would have happened if he hadn’t decided to leave his comfort zone.

“My question for you guys, which I hope you will spend some time thinking about, is: what’s on the other side of your discomfort and vulnerability? What are those things that you want to do, but you tell yourself you can’t? What are those conversations that you are having that maybe you’re not having,” he asked.